Microsoft has unveiled Project Solara, a chip-to-cloud platform designed to power a new generation of "agent-first" enterprise devices — hardware designed to run AI agents instead of traditional apps. Announced at the Microsoft Build 2026 Developer Conference on the 2nd of June, the platform, developed by Microsoft's Applied Sciences Group, features a lightweight edge OS called the Microsoft Device Ecosystem Platform (MDEP). Interestingly, the OS is built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) rather than Windows.
MDEP is paired with Azure-hosted agent services and persistent cloud-based state, meaning devices act as interfaces to AI agents running across Microsoft's cloud infrastructure rather than as fully self-contained computers. Together, the software stack forms what Microsoft describes as a chip-to-cloud architecture for enterprise AI devices, combining cloud-hosted agents with centralized security, management, and orchestration capabilities.
